“I’m ready to come back, Coach. My hand is feeling better, it’s progressing better than the doctors thought.”

Coach Fable rolls up his sleeves. “So that’s how you like to do it. Just roll in here and tell me you’re coming back. Star fucking player with a star player fucking attitude. Well, Flynn, we’ve been doing fine without you.”

I feel my chest clench up a little.

“I’m sorry I haven’t been the most communicative, lately.”

Coach leans down, putting his palms on the desk. “That’s an understatement. I don’t know what the hell you’ve been up to, but you sure as hell haven’t been supporting the team. You’ve been flying around to New York, Costa Rica, who knows where else you’ve been.”

I clench my jaw, running my fingers over my right hand. My eyes snap up to him. “How’d you know I was in Costa Rica?”

Coach shakes his head. “I’m getting more damn information from the paparazzi about your whereabouts than you. What does that tell me about your communication skills? Your agent had no clue, either.”

“I wanted to tell you about that. But it was personal.”

“Personal?” Coach raises his voice, pacing around the room, running a hand through his hair and looking like he’s about to lose his mind. “We’re paying you twenty-five million fucking dollars a year, and you’re telling me it’s goddamn ‘personal?’ Give me a fucking break.”

“Coach, I can explain,” I say, my heart hammering hard. I realize that--other than Lacy and Chandler, I haven’t told anyone in my life the full story about why I’ve been slinking around lately.

Steadying my gaze on Coach, I take a deep breath.

“Andrea is teeing the story up for the media as we speak, so I suppose now is as good a time as any to tell you.”

“Tell me what?”

“Where I’ve been.”

“I get that. Out with it.”

“I was looking for my father…and I found him.”

Coach’s eyes widen. His mouth falls open, but then closes before he even says a word.

“It’s confusing, I know. I’ve never felt it appropriate to touch on this subject since it’s personal. But it’s obviously bleeding into my professional life, now.”

Coach clears his throat. “So you were visiting your father…” he squints. “In Costa Rica?”

I nod. “I’d never met him before then.”

He twists his head slightly, and gives me a confused look. “So you were on this reckless trip, not supporting the team from the bench, because you were tracking your father down.”

“That’s right. But there’s more. Chandler and I found out we are brothers. Well, maybe we’re cousins and our fathers are identical twins. But more than likely we have the same father.”

Coach blinks a few times, and puts his hand over his heart. It’s a pose I’ve never really seen him take on.

“Are you fucking serious? You and Chandler are…”

His eyes dart from my face, to the pictures of all the starting players in our last team picture.

“Blood brothers.”

His eyes dart back to me.

“Dear Christ in heaven. I always thought there was a resemblance. But, brothers…”

I shrug. “Not that it matters for games. Once I’m back, we’re still going to play just like we always have. We play great together. Like Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen.”

All the color seems to run out of his face. “Coach. You okay?”

He swallows slowly. “I was just about to tell you before you gave me your news. I’ve requested a trade. Ownership okay’d it.”

My heart drops. “No. You’re not serious. What about the championship?”

Sitting down, he pushes the fingers of his hands together like he’s Mr. Burns. “Ownership thinks they can win the championship without you.”

“Where do they want to send me?”

“Toronto.”

My jaw drops. “But they’re in last place.”

“Yeah. They want to offload your salary.”

“Toronto’s in a fucking rebuilding year. How do you trade the MVP?”

“If I would have known everything you just told me...it might have changed things. I’m sorry, Carter.”

I mumble something about wringing my agent’s neck for not keeping me in the loop on news, and slam the door on the way out, not giving coach a chance to elaborate.

“Christ,” I say to no one in particular in the locker room, leaning against the wall. “I can’t believe this is happening.”

Pulling out my phone, I notice there’s a voice message from Lacy. She must have touched down in New York already.

When I listen to the message, my blood runs cold.

It really puts things in perspective.

I sigh, looking at the shut door of Coach’s office.

Using my phone, I call a Lyft and head straight to the airport to buy a ticket to Blackwell.

I call my mom and give her the heads up that I’m coming home, which she’s happy to hear. She’s already at the hospital with Lacy’s family.

I call Lacy too, but there’s no answer. She’s probably up in the air headed home to be with her dad, understandably.

I’m sitting in my seat, waiting for the plane to take off, a call comes in from a private number.

Normally I don’t answer anything from numbers I don’t know. But I’ve got so many balls in the air right now. I answer it.

“Hello?”

The voice that speaks sends chills over me. It’s one of those deep, modified voices.

“Carter Flynn. Withdraw the story about you and Chandler.”

“Who the fuck is this. Liam? Are you playing a joke?”

Liam Blackwell, my childhood friend from Blackwell, has been prank calling me since we first got our cell phones in high school.

“It’s not important who this is,” the voice says. “Just do it. Withdraw the story, and say you were making up the whole thing for publicity.”

“Seriously, who the fuck is this, and why should I listen to you?”

“Trust me when I say, you don’t want it to have to come to that. Just do the right thing, Mr. Flynn.”

“Who are you?” I say, as the flight attendant walks by, giving me the evil eye for being on the phone.

“Who I am is not important. But rest assured that you’ll want to obey me. Make this easy on yourself. Do as I say, and nothing bad will happen.”

“Sir,” The flight attendant cuts in. “I need to ask you to hang up the phone.”

I press the red button and hang up, worked up with fury.

“Sorry about that.”

A chill stays with my body, though. I don’t respond to threats.

Even so, that was fucking freaky.